The Cadet Party, the leading party of the liberal bourgeoisie in
Russia, has a number of men at its headquarters who have received a
European education. In our day a man cannot be regarded as educated if he
is not generally familiar with Marxism and the West-European working-class
movement.

Since they have a large number of bourgeois intellectuals in their
ranks, the Russian Cadets are, of course, familiar with Marxism; among them
there are even some who were Marxists, or near-Marxists in their youth, but
who grew “wiser” as they grew older and became liberal philistines.

All this explains the difference between the attitude of the old,
European liberals, and that of the new, Russian liberals towards
Social-Democracy. The former tried to prevent the emergence of
Social-Democracy and denied its right to existence; the latter have been
obliged to resign themselves to the fact: “We have no doubt,”
says the leading article in Rech (No. 287), “that
Social-Democracy is destined to become the open political party of the
proletariat in Russia.” That is why the fight our liberals arc waging
against Social-Democracy has assumed the form of a struggle in
favour of opportunism in the ranks of Social-Democracy.

Impotent to prevent the rise and growth of Social-Democracy, our
liberal bourgeois are doing their best to make it grow in the liberal
way. Hence, the prolonged and systematic efforts of our Cadets to
foster opportunism (and liquidationism in particular) in the ranks of the
Social-Democrats; the liberals rightly regard this as the
only way of retaining
their influence over the proletariat and of making the working class
dependent upon the liberal bourgeoisie.

The liberals’ appraisal of the fight waged by the six workers’ deputies
against the seven pro-liquidator deputies is therefore very instructive. As
onlookers, the liberals are compelled candidly to admit the main fact: the
seven are the “parliamentary elements of Social-Democracy”, they are a
“party of parliamentary activity”, they have in their ranks “the entire
intelligentsia of the Duma Social-Democrats”. Their line is that of the
“evolution of Social-Democracy into an open parliamentary party”, a line
connected with a special “trend in tactics”. “Novaya Rabochaya
Gazeta is the organ of the Social-Democrat parliamentarians.”

Za Pravdu, on the contrary, is the “organ of the
irreconcilables”, says Rech, who are not a party of parliamentary
activity but are the “antithesis of such a party”.

The party of “intellectual deputies” versus “workers’
deputies”, such is Rech’s verdict. Rech says
superciliously that it is impossible to tell whom the majority of the
workers support, but it refutes itself in the very next breath by the
following illuminating passage:

“The longer the transition to this normal existence”
(i.e., open, legal existence) “is delayed,” it says, “the more reason
will there be to anticipate that the parliamentary majority of the
Social-Democratic intellectuals will be compelled to yield to the
non-parliamentary workers’ majority and to its present mood. We saw
the deplorable consequences of such a divergence of trends at the end of
1905. And whatever one’s opinion may be of the future upshot of the present
impasse, it is hardly likely that anyone will be found to justify the
blunders committed by the inexperienced leaders of the spontaneous mass
temper in those winter months.” This is what Rech writes.

We have stressed what interests us now particularly in this admission.

The non-parliamentary workers’ majority versus the “parliamentary
majority of the Social-Democratic intellectuals”,—even the liberals
perceive this as the issue in the controversy between the six and the
seven.

The seven and Novaya Rabochaya Gazeta represent the majority
of the self-styled Social-Democratic intelligentsia as opposed to
the “non-parliamentary workers’ majority”, as opposed to the
Party.

The old party has disappeared; we don’t need the old party; we will do
without the party, we will make shift with one newspaper and activities in
the Duma, and advocate the formation of an open party in the future—such,
virtually, is the position of the seven and the position of all
liquidators.

One can understand, therefore, why the liberals speak so kindly of the
seven and of the liquidators, why they praise them for understanding
parliamentary conditions, and refer to their tactics as “intricate,
thoughtful and not oversimplified”. The seven and the liquidators carry
liberal slogans into the ranks of the working class—why should
not the liberals praise them? The liberals could not wish for anything
better than the erection of a bulwark of intellectuals, parliamentarians
and legalists against the old party, against the
“non-parliamentary workers’ majority”.

Let this bulwark call itself Social-Democratic; its name is not
important, what is important is its liberal-labour policy—that is the way
the enlightened bourgeoisie argues, and from its point of view it argues
quite correctly.

The liberals have realised (and have blurted out) what all
class-conscious, advanced workers realised long ago—that the Novaya
Rabochaya Gazeta group and the seven that follow its lead, are this
bulwark of liberal intellectuals who have split off from the
Social-Democratic Party, repudiate the Party, denounce its “underground”
activities and pursue a systematic policy of concessions to bourgeois
reformism, bourgeois nationalism, etc.

The unity of the “non-parliamentary workers’ majority”, which is the
genuine Party majority and is really independent of the liberal
bourgeoisie, is inconceivable unless this bulwark of intellectual
liquidators of the workers’ party is vigorously combated.